When an anesthesiologist is negligent, it is possible for a patient to lose blood fluid during surgery, which leads to a loss of blood flow to the brain. As a result, the patient could suffer strokes to both side of the brain—leading to irreversible brain damage.

Does anesthesia affect your brain long term?

Exposure to anesthesia to the aged brain can be a risk of the long-lasting impairments of cognitive function. However, the neuroprotective property of general anesthetics in brain injury is also increasingly recognized.

What does anesthesia do to your brain?

Anesthetics primarily act on receptors located in the brain and produce oscillations in the brain's circuits, leading to a state of consciousness that it is much more similar to a coma than to sleep.